Stereotyped, Racist Images Hurt Black Men`s Job Chances

COMMENTARY

April 21, 1991|By DAVID BRODER, Washington Post Writers Group

In the political precincts of Washington, the debate about civil rights is conducted in nice, polite terms. Lawyers argue about the meaning of words in the Supreme Court decisions on employment discrimination. Politicians debate the precise point at which legislation goes beyond affirmative action and verges into quotas.

Hardly anyone wants to deal with the underlying reality of race -- and the way it splits this nation. Only occasionally does the blunt language of the real world intrude.

It happened last week in a briefing at the Brookings Institution, the 75- year-old dowager of Washington think tanks, on its newly published volume called The Urban Underclass.

In one of the papers, authors Joleen Kirschenman and Kathryn M. Neckerman of the University of Chicago wrote, ``We were overwhelmed by the degree to which Chicago employers felt comfortable talking with us -- in a situation where the temptation would be to conceal rather than reveal -- in a negative manner about blacks.``

I called Kirschenman and asked what they meant. During 1988-89, they conducted face-to-face interviews with 185 Chicago-area employers about the way in which they picked people for jobs.

``I was shocked at the open way they talked about race,`` she said.

I know this to be true from voter interviews -- including many last year in Chicago. But reporters tend to self-censor the biased comments that show how strong are the racial stereotypes -- and how high are the resulting barriers -- in this society. The two scholars reported what they heard from a suburban drug store manager, among others:

``It`s unfortunate, but in my business I think overall (black men) tend to be known to be dishonest,`` the store manager said. ``I think that`s too bad, but that`s the image they have ... They`re known to be lazy ... Whether they are or not, I don`t know, but it`s an image that is perceived.``

He was asked, ``How do you think that image was developed?``

``Go look in the jails,`` he said -- and laughed.

Kirschenman and Neckerman say that the racial stereotypes become more virulent when the applicants` language, style of dress, schooling and place of residence place them in the lower class. Together, these factors form a classification system in the minds of these employers that puts inner-city blacks at the bottom of the list when it comes to hiring decisions.

It`s hardly a surprise, then, that unemployment rates are far, far higher among inner-city black males than any other population group. Kirschenman told me that she would exonerate most of the employers she interviewed of ``racism.`` ``They just happen to be on the front-line of a problem the society has failed to address,`` she said.

Today, the prevailing view in the courts and in American society is that employers should not be asked to bend their hiring policies in order to provide work for such men. But if that is this nation`s decision, then what is our response to the millions in the underclass, who live lives of complete desolation in the hearts of our cities?

The British weekly The Economist raised exactly that question forcibly in an April cover story on ``America`s wasted blacks.``

Speaking of blunt language, I cannot improve on The Economist`s summary:

``Whites need to recognize that blacks cannot hope to prosper in any numbers while they are confined to ghettos of crime, poverty and lousy schools, and that it is society`s duty to do something about it.

``That means the same law enforcement in inner cities that the rest of the country expects and receives ... It means gun control, which urban blacks want, but many whites illogically hate. It means treatment, not just punishment, for drug dealers. It means expensive policies from governments and companies to lure better teachers and school managers into the cities, to build transport links to the suburbs where the jobs are, to train young people for jobs.``

The Economist quotes Lyndon Johnson`s 1965 words: ``If we stand passively by while the center of each city becomes a hive of deprivation, crime and hopelessness ... if we become two people, the suburban affluent and the urban poor, each filled with mistrust and fear for the other ... then we shall effectively cripple each generation to come.``

``A generation has passed,`` The Economist rightly says, ``and the crippling goes on.`` Where is a national leader who will say it must stop?